Arnold Book Bodybuilding

[Senaqua Hildreth]

ArnoldAlois Schwarzenegger (born July 30, 1947) is an Austrian and American actor, businessman, filmmaker, former politician, and former professional bodybuilder known for his roles in high-profile action films. He served as the 38th governor of California from 2003 to 2011.[5]

As a registered member of the Republican Party, Schwarzenegger chaired the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports during most of the George H. W. Bush administration. In 2003, he was elected Governor of California in a special recall election to replace Gray Davis, the governor at the time. He received 48.6 percent of the vote, 17 points ahead of the runner-up, Cruz Bustamante of the Democratic Party. He was sworn in on November 17 to serve the remainder of Davis' term, and was reelected in the 2006 gubernatorial election with an increased vote share of 55.9 percent to serve a full term.[14] In 2011 he reached his term limit as governor and returned to acting.

Schwarzenegger was nicknamed the "Austrian Oak" in his bodybuilding days, "Arnie" or "Schwarzy" during his acting career,[15] and "the Governator" (a portmanteau of "Governor" and "Terminator") during his political career. He married Maria Shriver, a niece of the former U.S. President John F. Kennedy, in 1986. They separated in 2011 after he admitted to having fathered a child with their housemaid in 1997; their divorce was finalized in 2021.[16]

Gustav married Aurelia on October 20, 1945; he was 38 and she was 23. According to Schwarzenegger, his parents were very strict: "Back then in Austria it was a very different world [...] if we did something bad or we disobeyed our parents, the rod was not spared."[22] He grew up in a Catholic family.[23] Gustav preferred his elder son, Meinhard, over Arnold.[24] His favoritism was "strong and blatant", which stemmed from unfounded suspicion that Arnold was not his biological child.[25] Schwarzenegger says that his earliest childhood memory is of climbing into his parents' bed during a bad thunder-and-lightning storm and cuddling between his mother and father.[26] He has said, however, that his father had "no patience for listening or understanding your problems".[23] He had a good relationship with his mother, with whom he kept in touch until her death.[27]

In an interview with Fortune in 2004, Schwarzenegger told how he suffered what "would now be called child abuse" at the hands of his father: "My hair was pulled. I was hit with belts. So was the kid next door. It was just the way it was. Many of the children I've seen were broken by their parents, which was the German-Austrian mentality. They didn't want to create an individual. It was all about conforming. I was one who did not conform, and whose will could not be broken. Therefore, I became a rebel. Every time I got hit, and every time someone said, 'You can't do this,' I said, 'This is not going to be for much longer because I'm going to move out of here. I want to be rich. I want to be somebody.'"[19]

At school, Schwarzenegger was reportedly academically average but stood out for his "cheerful, good-humored, and exuberant" character.[23] He struggled with reading and was later diagnosed as being dyslexic.[28][29] Money was a problem in their household; Schwarzenegger recalled that one of the highlights of his youth was when the family bought a refrigerator.[25] His father Gustav was an athlete, and wished for his sons to become champions in Bavarian curling.[30] Influenced by his father, Schwarzenegger played several sports as a boy.[23]

Schwarzenegger began weight training in 1960 when his football coach took his team to a local gym.[17] At age 14, he chose bodybuilding over football as a career.[11][31] He later said, "I actually started weight training when I was 15, but I'd been participating in sports, like soccer, for years, so I felt that although I was slim, I was well-developed, at least enough so that I could start going to the gym and start Olympic lifting."[22] However, his official website biography claims that "at 14, he started an intensive training program with Dan Farmer, studied psychology at 15 (to learn more about the power of mind over body) and at 17, officially started his competitive career."[32] During a speech in 2001, he said, "My own plan formed when I was 14 years old. My father had wanted me to be a police officer like he was. My mother wanted me to go to trade school."[33]

Schwarzenegger took to visiting a gym in Graz, where he also frequented the local movie theaters to see films with bodybuilding idols such as Reg Park, Steve Reeves and Johnny Weissmuller.[22] When Reeves died in 2000, Schwarzenegger fondly remembered him: "As a teenager, I grew up with Steve Reeves. His remarkable accomplishments allowed me a sense of what was possible when others around me didn't always understand my dreams. Steve Reeves has been part of everything I've ever been fortunate enough to achieve." In 1961, Schwarzenegger met former Mr. Austria Kurt Marnul, who invited him to train at the gym in Graz.[17] He was so dedicated as a youngster that he broke into the local gym on weekends to train even when it was closed. "It would make me sick to miss a workout... I knew I couldn't look at myself in the mirror the next morning if I didn't do it." When asked about his first cinema experience as a boy, he replied: "I was very young, but I remember my father taking me to the Austrian theaters and seeing some newsreels. The first real movie I saw, that I distinctly remember, was a John Wayne movie."[22] In Graz, he was mentored by Alfred Gerstl, who had Jewish ancestry and later became president of the Federal Council, and befriended his son Karl.[34][35]

Schwarzenegger's brother, Meinhard, died in a car crash on May 20, 1971.[17] He was driving drunk and died instantly. Schwarzenegger did not attend his funeral. Meinhard was engaged to Erika Knapp, and they had a three-year-old son named Patrick. Schwarzenegger paid for Patrick's education and helped him to move to the U.S.[25] Schwarzenegger's father, Gustav, died of a stroke on December 13, 1972.[17] In Pumping Iron, Schwarzenegger claimed that he did not attend his father's funeral because he was training for a bodybuilding contest. Later, he and the film's producer said this story was taken from another bodybuilder to show the extremes some would go to for their sport and to make Schwarzenegger's image colder to create controversy for the film.[36] However, Barbara Baker, his first serious girlfriend, recalled that he informed her of his father's death without emotion and that he never spoke of his brother.[37] Over time, he has given at least three versions of why he was absent from his father's funeral.[25]

Charles "Wag" Bennett, one of the judges at the 1966 competition, was impressed with Schwarzenegger and offered to coach him. As Schwarzenegger had little money, Bennett invited him to stay in his crowded family home above one of his two gyms in Forest Gate, London. Yorton's leg definition had been judged superior, and Schwarzenegger, under a training program devised by Bennett, concentrated on improving his. Staying in the East End of London helped Schwarzenegger improve his rudimentary English.[38][39] Living with the Bennetts also changed him as a person: "Being with them made me so much more sophisticated. When you're the age I was then, you're always looking for approval, for love, for attention and also for guidance. At the time, I wasn't really aware of that. But now, looking back, I see that the Bennett family fulfilled all those needs. Especially my need to be the best in the world. To be recognized and to feel unique and special. They saw that I needed that care and attention and love."[40]

Also in 1966, at Bennett's home, Schwarzenegger had the opportunity to meet childhood idol Reg Park, who became his friend and mentor.[40][41] The training paid off and, in 1967, Schwarzenegger won the title for the first time, becoming the youngest ever Mr. Universe at age 20.[32] He would go on to win the title another three times.[31] He then returned to Munich, where he attended business school and worked at Rolf Putziger's gym, where he worked and trained from 1966 to 1968 before returning to London in 1968 to win his next Mr. Universe title.[32] He frequently told Roger C. Field, his English coach and friend in Munich at the time, "I'm going to become the greatest actor!"[42]

Schwarzenegger, who dreamed of moving to the US since age ten, and saw bodybuilding as his avenue of opportunity,[43] realized his dream by moving to the US in October 1968 at age 21, speaking little English.[31][17] There he trained at Gold's Gym in Venice, Los Angeles, California, under Joe Weider's supervision. From 1970 to 1974, one of Schwarzenegger's weight training partners was Ric Drasin, a professional wrestler who designed the original Gold's Gym logo in 1973.[44] Schwarzenegger also became good friends with professional wrestler Superstar Billy Graham. In 1970, at age 23, Schwarzenegger captured his first Mr. Olympia title in New York, and would go on to win the title seven times.[32]

The immigration law firm Siskind & Susser has stated that Schwarzenegger may have been an illegal immigrant at some point in the late 1960s or early 1970s because of violations in the terms of his visa.[45] LA Weekly said in 2002 that Schwarzenegger was "the most famous US immigrant", who "overcame a thick Austrian accent and transcended the unlikely background of bodybuilding to become the biggest movie star in the world in the 1990s".[43]

Schwarzenegger is considered among the most important figures in the history of bodybuilding,[9] and his legacy is commemorated in the Arnold Classic annual bodybuilding competition. He has remained a prominent face in bodybuilding long after his retirement, in part because of his ownership of gyms and fitness magazines. He has presided over numerous contests and awards shows.

For many years, he wrote a monthly column for the bodybuilding magazines Muscle & Fitness and Flex. Shortly after being elected governor, he was appointed the executive editor of both magazines, in a largely symbolic capacity. The magazines agreed to donate $250,000 a year to the Governor's various physical fitness initiatives. When the deal, including the contract that gave Schwarzenegger at least $1 million a year, was made public in 2005, many criticized it as being a conflict of interest since the governor's office made decisions concerning regulation of dietary supplements in California.[50] Consequently, Schwarzenegger relinquished the executive editor role in 2005.[50] American Media Inc., which owns Muscle & Fitness and Flex, announced in March 2013 that Schwarzenegger had accepted their renewed offer to be executive editor of the magazines.[50]

3a8082e126